


The Pensive Lupin

by who5555



Series: The Pensieve Series [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Hogwarts, Lost Years, Marauders, Moony - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-15
Updated: 2014-11-15
Packaged: 2018-02-25 12:10:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2621186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/who5555/pseuds/who5555
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dumbledore asks Lupin to be the new professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts. He spends a whole night thinking about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Pensive Lupin

Remus Lupin had been living a lonely life for twelve years. It was not a choice of his, but rather an accident of life. He avoided to think much, because maybe that would bring too much pain, so, he simply did what he had to do in order to survive. But, a visit, a few nights ago, took him completely by surprise, giving him a subtle and rare moment of happiness. More than so, though, it was what he was asking of him that caused an explosion of emotions inside of him. His poor mind, who’ve been neglected and numb for these past years, could barely handle it all at once. Professor Dumbledore came to ask of him to be the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at the school he so dearly loved. It all felt too much.  
On the following days, it all felt like a joke. He have been living in a semi-derelict cottage in Yorkshire. How could have Dumbledore, always such a busy man, have tracked him down? “Maybe I was dreaming”, he thought, the night after the visit, “Maybe I’ve gone completely mad at once!”. But, apparently, if it all was to be a joke, it was an elaborated one. That night he found a package lying in front of the small cottage.  
Curious, and a bit suspicious, he opened it. Inside of it there was a suitcase. He unwrapped it and read it out loud: “Professor R. J. Lupin”. Cold chills ran through his body. Nothing could have erased his doubts like that suitcase. So it wasn’t a dream, Dumbledore had visited him. And, yes, he would become the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. Again, it all felt too much.  
He needed to take a breath, so, he carefully held the suitcase and sat on the staircase outside the cottage.  
When he notice that he was holding it like a baby, he laughed, for the first time in a long while. Then, he placed it on a step below him and stared at his name. But, while his eyes were fixed on that new thing, his mind traveled away to places he has been trying so hard to ignore.  
He was thinking about his mother, his father, but, most of all, he was thinking about his friends. But, strangly, for the first time, it wasn’t pain that dominated him at their thought, but a joyful energy, almost as if his mind was allowing him to forget the bad part. He was thinking about how they would react if they knew that he was about to become a teacher. “Professor R. J. Lupin”, he read out loud again. “Professor”.  
His mind was joking with him. So all the emotions it didn’t allow himself to feel, it added to new ghosts, each with the face of one friend. At first, he dared to think of them as proud friends, that would lead them to the train station when classes began. But then, he thought that this thought wasn’t fair to them. So his mind dedicated to try to imitate what they would really have done.  
Sirius would probably mock him. But he would understand that that was his way of showing he has feelings. Poor Sirius. The family he grew up with never teach him how to show love for others. Remus remembered how he was always angry towards the end of the war, but he also knew that that was just because he was missing his best friend, James.  
James. James would probably mock him when around Sirius, because that’s the best they did, but, he would really be the proudest. He would smile at Lupin, touch his hair in an attempt to make it look like his, he would tell everyone. “Hey! Look who’s the new defense against the dark arts’ teacher!!”, like a proud little brother. James couldn’t hide his feelings, he was raised well enough to know no other way.  
Peter would be silent, but always positive. He would laugh at Sirius’ mocks and smile admired at James’ show off. In secret, he would let Lupin know how happy he actually was and endlessly repeat how much he deserved it.  
And then there was sweet Lily. Lily always treated him kindly, despite having all the reasons not to. Lily would hug, because, just like her husband, she didn’t care to show her feelings. She would also ask him all about it, tell him how much she misses classes sometimes, and help him to prepare for classes.  
A warmth feeling took over his body, and a smiled started to cross his face.  
He touched his pocket and found an old drawing Peter had given him as a graduation present. It was a drawing of the four of them, sitting near the window at the boys’ room on the Gryffindor tower. During the war, he found peace looking at it. But that was before their death.  
Under the drawing, Peter wrote: “To the following years!” At the time, Remus dearly loved his attempt to stick to the past. They both feared the future in secret, but never shared the thought with the other friends, for they knew they wouldn’t understand.  
His mind tried to escape it, but his eyes ran to it. Next to James sat Sirius Black and the sight of him made all the warmth feeling go away, and his stomach twitched.  
After the initial shock left him, twelve years ago, Lupin desperately tried to take Sirius out of the drawing, but never succeeded. If he scratched him off or if he cut him out of it, that would make the whole thing crumble apart. Sirius was sitting too close to James, as they always were. Later, before he gave up, Lupin noticed it would also leave him alone with the dead.  
Suddenly, a pain harder than the one he felt every full moon strike him right through the heart, leaving his hand shaking. He even dropped the drawing.  
James, Peter and Lily were dead. And it was all Sirius’ fault.  
Sirius, who treated James like a brother. Sirius, who considered James’ parents as their own. Sirius, who tried his best to ignore his family hate for the muggle world.  
A hidden place in Lupin’s heart held tight to the idea that it wasn’t Sirius’ fault, that, somehow, everyone got it wrong. But he repressed this idea because it was harder that to face the truth.  
The truth was that he get powerless when he thinks about that fatidic night he lost his four best friends. Then, the way he continued to feel powerless the following years because he had never thought of a fair way to avenge his three best friends. Would killing Sirius really solve anything? Sending him to Azkaban be the ultimate solution? No. It didn’t sound like something the dead would have liked. He spent endless sleepless nights thinking about it.  
It was only after Dumbledore’s visit and the mention of Harry Potter that he realized something. He have been focusing on the dead for so long he completely ignored the only one who survived that night. Yes, he read The Daily Prophet. Yes, he was aware of his importance for the Wizarding World. But he was so lost inside his own mind, he never thought of him as “James and Lily’s son” or “Sirius’ godson”. When Dumbledore mentioned him under this perspective, it was almost as if a bucket of ice water had been thrown at him. The answer was not in Sirius Black. The answer was Harry Potter. Sirius had escaped Azkaban. He was probably going to finish what he started that night. He killed Peter first, and Remus had never understood why it wasn’t him. His blood was worse than Peter’s! So Sirius was going to try to kill Harry in order to clear the way for his master’s comeback. He couldn’t let it happen. He needed to protect Harry Potter! That sounded like something his friend would approve.  
He now deviated the eyes from the suitcase and looked around. That was the first time in a really long time that he was allowing himself to think of the past as a whole, instead of just accepting the nightmares or screaming random names in the middle of the day. He then noticed how none of it never really left him. It was with surprised that he saw that there was no one around the cottage. His mind was so loud, but he was still alone.  
After a sad and heavy sigh, he got up, suitcase on his hands, and decided to start packing.


End file.
